1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to a pet food, and in particular, to a pet food containing a significant quantity of a cereal product in a palatable form for carnivorous animals.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There has been an increase in popularity of chunky products for pet foods, particulary for canned pet foods where chunks of meats, fish or cheese are incorporated in aqueous broths containing flavoring and thickening agents, vegetables, vitamins and the like. The chunky ingredients of these foods are, however, relatively expensive and less expensive substitutes are desired.
Various attempts have been made to produce synthetic cheese or meat solids in the form of spreads or chunks by the use of gelatininzed starches and the like to coagulate and solidify mixtures of protein and fat. An undesirable aspect of these products is that they are not stable to cooking and, therefore, are ill-suited for canning, and must be preserved by dehydration, maintenance of high concentrations of sugar, and other methods which detract from their acceptability. Additionally, these products employ relatively minor amounts of starch and the basic or major components in these products are usually expensive proteins and fats. These synthetic materials are usually more expensive than the natural food and find market acceptance for spepcial diets where natural products would be objectionable because of the natural products' high cholesterol contents, tendencies to spoil, and other shortcomings.
Although it has been generally known that a minor amount of glycerol monostearate imparts non-sticking properties to cereals and cereal pastes, and thereby permits these materials to withstand prolonged cooking and retorting without becoming sticky or losing firmness, heretofore, there has been no application of this knowledge to the preparation of a synthetic cheese or meat solid. In particular, there has been no attempt to utilize glycerol monostearate to prepare retort-stable cereal chunks having a meat, fish or cheese flavoring agent and other components to enhance the simulation of a natural meat, fish or cheese product. Additionally, there has been no successful attempt to incorporate significant quantities of cereal products in pet foods while still maintaining a sufficiently high level of a palatability in the final product that finds ready acceptance by carnivorous animals trained or accustomed to a high-protein meat diet.